


Remember us not as lost, violent souls

by natcat5



Series: Femslash February [1]
Category: Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magika | Puella Magi Madoka Magica
Genre: AU, F/F, Femslash February, Gangs, Modern AU, Multi, Puellas on rollerblades, Street Fights
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-02-09
Updated: 2014-02-09
Packaged: 2018-01-11 18:59:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,640
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1176698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/natcat5/pseuds/natcat5
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which the Puella Magi and the Witches are rival gangs fighting for control of the city. </p>
<p>In which love is hard and friendship is hard and everything is hard when the two begin to overlap.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Remember us not as lost, violent souls

First

“Oh, I see.” Says Mami Tomoe, looking at her with eyes full of both sadness and understanding. “This is your first time seeing this type of fight, isn’t it?”

Madoka can only nod wordlessly, hesitantly creeping out from behind the dumpster she was taking shelter behind.

The pavement is littered with broken glass and busted pieces of metal. Dark splotches dot the ground, beside torn pieces of clothing and skid marks. Mami smiles at her, the knees of her stockings ripped out and blood stains on her blouse and jacket. There’s a smear across her cheek, and on the barrel of the still smoking gun she’s holding. The serene look on her face is nothing like the serious expression she wore just minutes ago, when she was firing shots at the wildhaired girl in the tattered, blood-stained school representative outfit.

“Well, I suppose there’s no hiding it now,” she sighs, shouldering her weapon and turning to fully face the younger girl. “Kaname-san, I am a Puella Magi.”

 

Watching 

The media has always painted the Puella Magi and Witches as squabbling gangs and nothing more. Unruly, violent girls who ran wild in the city, fighting each other without reason and without restraint.

But Mami is a kind, and well-liked upper year student. She has a pleasant demeanor and is always helpful to others. Violent and unruly are the last words anyone would use to describe her.

They are, however, the words she uses to describe the Witches.

“Lawless,” she declares with contempt, “And without regard for human life. Girls who have given up on everything- on humanity, on hope. They’ve fallen into despair, and only wish to spread the same kind of pain to others.” Then she smiles, a bitter one that doesn’t reach her eyes. “The Puella Magi exist only to corral the damage. To counter them when they emerge to do harm. I am not a battle-hungry Yankee, Kaname-san. I am merely trying to protect our city.”

“I believe you!” exclaims Madoka, hearing the defensive note creeping into Mami’s voice. “Mami-san, I don’t think you’d ever fight senselessly. You don’t seem like that type of person. I-,”

Madoka falters, hands interlaced as she looks down at her feet.

She is quiet, she is plain. She lives her life carefully and mundanely, never reaching above average on anything. Merely _existing,_ without true purpose. To Madoka, Mami has found something that she herself has been striving for. A _purpose,_ and a duty. The older girl is fighting for justice, is fighting to protect. It’s admirable, and Madoka remembers the look of pride and triumph in Mami’s eyes when she had finally driven away the Witch that had been attacking her.

“What’s…it like?” she asks hesitantly, and then blushes, embarrassed. “I-I mean, to have to fight all the time…t-to work so hard to protect everyone…It’s a hard life for me to imagine…”

_Because I’m useless._ Is the conclusion that she doesn’t say. Madoka points her toes inwards and fiddles with her hands, cheeks crimson as she averts her gaze from the older girl’s.

Mami looks surprised for a half a second, golden eyes widening, before she releases a short, breathy laugh and tilts her head to the side.

“Well, Kaname-san,” she replies, in the conciliatory tone of voice she always uses for her kouhais at school, “Why don’t you see for yourself, and form your own opinions?”

\--

For the next week, Madoka follows Mami on her Witch hunts, and watches from a short distance. The older girl wears roller blades to give herself speed, and has caches of various firearms and rope hidden around the city. She speeds down streets, bounces of the sides of buildings and down handrails, and laughs breezily before backflipping down a stairwell.

Madoka watches with wide eyes as Mami pulls a pair of rifles out of a hidden hole beneath a wall, and fires round after round at the Witch that she had been tracking. The redhaired girl, with bared teeth and a spiked whip, dances away from the charges with difficulty, and screeches when one explodes against her leg and another against her shoulder.

Madoka scrunches her eyes shut and tries not to scream. But when she cracks one eye open just in time to see the Witch’s whip singing through the air towards Mami, the scream tears itself from her throat unbidden.

But the blonde Puella is fast, and she skids out of the way, making a perfect turn to reposition herself behind her opponent and hit her with a direct blast to the skull.

Madoka covers her eyes, not wanting to see the explosion of brain matter and skull and blood and skin, and feeling her stomach turn and twist with apprehension and disgust. But then Mami’s hand is on her shoulder, gentle and kind as always, and she looks up with tears clouding her vision.

“I’m not a murderer, Kaname-san,” she says softly, eyes shadowed and smile strained, “My bullets are made to bruise and fracture and occasionally break. They’re like high-magnitude paintball guns, really. Do you think I could do this every night if I was killing every Witch I came across?”

Madoka startles, and she looks hesitantly towards the fallen Witch.

The girl is tied up, with Mami’s signature yellow rope, and her skull is miraculaously intact, though a trickle of blood snakes its way down her forehead. She’s hogtied and hurt, but not dead.

Madoka almost chokes on her relief, and she clutches at Mami’s sleeve wordlessly. Her last seed of doubt has been uprooted, and she’s now convinced that Mami is nothing less than a heroine. Fighting evil night after night, but never stooping to their level. Never killing them, regardless of how vicious their attacks grew. She’s strong and fast and clever and experienced and _brave._ Brave because she does this _alone._

“Mami-san-,” she breathes out, voice choked with emotion, “Mami-san, I-,”

The sound of sirens cuts through the silence of the night, and Mami lets out a nervous laugh before pulling Madoka to her feet and skating away into an alley.

“They’re fast only when it’s inconvenient, isn’t it so?” she chuckles breezily, her speed slower than usual to accommodate Madoka running behind her. “We shall have to continue this conversation another time, Kaname-san.”

 

Holding Hands 

 

On Witch hunts, Mami wears thick leather gloves to protect her hands. They’re ragged and lined with cuts and always warm to touch. The leather is tough and scratchy, but there’s a power in those gloved hands that fills Madoka with a sense of security whenever she’s holding onto them.

In her house, Mami’s hands are still warm, but they’re softer. They’re worn from dish scrubbing and clothes washing. Burn marks from hot tea and cuts from vegetable knives. Their grip is no less firm without the gloves, and no less reassuring.

Madoka’s neck is flushed, and the feeling of Mami’s thumb rubbing circles over top of her own is distracting, but she keeps her eyes locked with the older girl’s, and tightens her hand so her grip doesn’t falter.

“Are you sure you want to do this, Kaname-san?” asks Mami, her usual soft smile missing as she looks at Madoka with concerned eyes. “This isn’t a decision to make lightly. If you start fighting them, they will learn to recognize you, and your nights will never be safe again.”

“They’re already not safe, with the Witches around, and only you stopping them,” she says firmly, because she has been thinking about this _hard._ Her life is mundane, yes. Meaningless. She is average in everything and excels in nothing. But she is _safe._ She has a Mama and a Papa and a little brother and they are safe and she is safe and her life is _safe._

Mami is not safe. Mami could die any night and even when she’s not fighting she knows there’s a chance that they will ambush her or attempt to take out their sole remaining threat in the city. All of the other Puella Magi are either in jail, have run away, or…

Or have been killed.

It’s only Mami who’s left. It’s only Mami who still bears the responsibility and the danger. She is brave and she is selfless and she has a great, and noble purpose.

Madoka has never considered herself a brave or noble person. But she believes in morals, in right and wrong, and she believes that that the Witches need to be stopped. She believes that Mami deserves support, and she believes that if her uselessness bothers her so much, than she should do something about it.

“I’m sure, Mami-san,” she says with more conviction than she’s ever had in her life. “Teach me.”

\--

It’s the hands that make her stop, and wonder.

Madoka, her sweet and adorable Madoka, can be scatterbrained and absentminded, so Sayaka doesn’t immediately become suspicious when Madoka starts hanging around with one of the older students, and showing up to class with bags under her eyes without explanation. She doesn’t press beyond her normal teasing when Madoka evades her questions, and laughs it off when Madoka runs off to talk to Tomoe-san during lunch. Madoka is one of the most easily trustable people in the world. She’s honest and earnest in everything, and Sayaka can’t imagine a lie coming out of that mouth.

But Sayaka takes Madoka’s hand one day, and feels soft skin replaced with hard callouses along her palms and fingers. Feels strength where there wasn’t any before. A strong grip, and hands she doesn’t recognize. She looks at Madoka from the corner of her eyes, watches her laugh with Hitomi about something while looking as carefree and kind as she always does. Except with shadows under her eyes, and a grip like steel.

Then, _then_ Sayaka begins to wonder.  

**Author's Note:**

> I'm following these prompts. http://lyraeon.tumblr.com/post/42066911827


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